Turkey's exports up over 10 pct in 2017

By Gokhan

ANKARA

Turkey's exports between January and December of 2017 amounted to over $157.05 billion -- a 10.2 percent rise compared with the previous year, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) announced Wednesday.

The country's foreign trade volume reached $390.84 billion during 2017, marking a 14.56 percent annual increase, according to provisional data produced by TurkStat and the Ministry of Customs and Trade.

Turkish imports climbed 17.7 percent to $233.79 billion, amounting to a foreign trade deficit of $76.73 billion -- rising 36.8 percent -- over the same period.

TurkStat said Germany was Turkey's top export market, at $15.12 billion, or a 9.6 percent share of total exports, while $73.94 billion worth of Turkish exports were delivered to EU28 countries from January to December this year.

In the same period, Turkey imported the most from China ($23.37 billion), Germany ($21.30 billion), and Russia ($19.51 billion).

Manufacturing dominates exports

The manufacturing industry accounted for the biggest share of total exports, at 93.7 percent, followed by agriculture and forestry (3.4 percent), and mining and quarrying (2.2 percent).

High technology products in manufacturing industry exports represented 3.9 percent. Export shares of medium-high and low technology products accounted for 34.6 and 33.3 percent, respectively.

Intermediate goods represented the lion's share of imports with 73.3 percent, reaching $171.45 billion, followed by capital goods (14.2 percent, $33.11 billion) and consumption goods (12.2 percent, $28.48 billion).

TurkStat data revealed that Turkish imports mostly came from the manufacturing industry (81.6 percent, $190.74 billion), of which $78.43 billion were medium-high tech imports, followed by medium-low tech ($62.14 billion) and high-tech ($28.82 billion).

Among Turkish cities, Istanbul exported the most in 2017 -- $81.48 billion -- followed by prominent industrial provinces Bursa and Kocaeli.

In December, Turkey's exports rose 8.6 percent year-on-year to reach $13.87 billion, while imports climbed to $23.08 billion -- a 25.4 percent hike. trade deficit was $9.2 billion.

In 2016, the country's exports totaled $142.53 billion, imports $198.61 billion and foreign trade deficit stood at $56.09 billion.